My name is Ken. I like to watch movies. I have written about over 350 films.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

"Enemy" Review

“Chaos is order yet undeciphered"

That quote
appears at the beginning of "Enemy" and it should be taken as a warning.
Throughout its 90-minute running time, Enemy takes you down an
unsettling path and doesn't let up until its shocking final shot. This
film is director Denis Villeneuve's follow-up to "Prisoners", which came
out last Fall, and if you thought the ending to "Prisoners" was baffling,
it's child's play compared to this. As that quote suggests, no
matter how crazy the final shot of Enemy seems on the surface,
everything will start to make sense once you decipher it. It's a
clever conclusion to an often tricky, clever little film, but the
ultimate question is... does it all work?

"Enemy" stars
Jake Gyllenhaal. This is his second collaboration with Villeneuve, after
"Prisoners"(Enemy was shot first), and it's clear that the two have developed a great rapport
with each other. What's remarkable about Jake Gyllenhaal in Enemy is
that he plays two roles and gives each character just enough subtle
differences that helps you tell each one apart. He's very intriguing to
watch in this film and he gives Enemy the necessary edge that it needs to keep it
from falling apart. Enemy's premise is a bit too silly to justify the
tone that Villenueve's going for, but Gyllenhaal is what makes the film consistently watchable.

Adam Bell (Gyllenhaal's primary role) is a
history professor at a small college in Toronto. When he's not lecturing his
students about fascism, Adam lives a very
cyclical, monotone life. Every day, he's teaching, grading papers, and
having meaningless sex with his girlfriend (played by Melanie Laurent). He occasionally gets a phone
call from his mother, but feels no reason to return her calls. He's
very sheltered, almost trapped in his little world, but this all changes when a colleague
of his randomly recommends a movie to him.

Adam takes him up on
the movie suggestion, but when he watches it, he notices something very
odd: one of the characters in the film looks exactly like him. At first,
he's just in disbelief, but his world quickly turns upside down when he eventually meets his
doppelganger face to face.

Denis Villenueve
demonstrates a remarkable sense of craft and style in this film, adding
just enough visual flourishes to keep you hooked. Enemy's score, written by Daniel Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans
consistently gives the impression that something strange is happening. It has a very uneasy, nervous, and paranoid feeling----which is
exactly how Adam Bell feels.

Still, I
could not help but feel that this serious exploration in style comes as
quite a contrast to the actual story that's taking place. We hardly get a
chance to explore the film's central premise before it all comes to a
head. And while there are surely many context clues to help you understand what the film's going for, from a thematic standpoint, Enemy is a little too emotionless to let it all sink in naturally.

No matter how hard you try to piece this all
together, you will never see the film's ending coming. I guarantee it.
It's so sudden, so out of left-field that it really took me aback at
first. The ending will baffle you, confuse you, it might even anger you.
While there are definitive thematic implications surrounding the film's
final shot, I keep thinking to myself whether the film really earned
this shocking moment. Enemy is a very tricky, twisty thriller but there
doesn't seem to be an emotional core. It has this thematic undercurrent
of individuality and fascism, but there's not enough of an emotional
pull to help you understand Adam Bell's struggles with the philosophical
implications of what he's going through.

With
Prisoners and Enemy, the one director that Denis Villeneuve reminds me
of is David Fincher. This is definitely an apt comparison. They both are
interested in exploring the thriller genre and their visual approach is
actually quite similar. But whereas Fincher's style has become so
intrinsically linked with the story and characters, Villenueve seems
much more interested in theme. I would argue that Villenueve's interest
in theme actually hurts both films. While I really enjoyed Prisoners,
much more than Enemy, I often felt that the film's themes and characters
were so closely linked together that there was very little room for
these characters to breathe. They, in effect, become so single-minded in
their actions that they start to feel secondary to theme.

By
contrast, Fincher's Mark Zuckerberg and Lisbeth Salander feel much more
free and open in their own cinematic worlds. While Zuckerberg may be a
bit monotone and emotionally closed off from everyone else, you do get
the sense that this is a three-dimensional character. Lisbeth Salander
also feels like a character who brings more to the table than just being
a tool to carry the plot forward. As much as Fincher is a visual
master, he's just as interested in character, which is a very underrated
aspect of him as a filmmaker. Villenueve has not really hit the sweet
spot, that balance between theme, character, and story at least not
between Prisoners and Enemy. If he were to let his characters breathe a
little more in his story, allow there to be time to break through the
rigid tone of each film, then I think he could wind up with something
really fantastic.

As it is, I don't think Enemy is a
bad film, but it's not particularly good either. It's an intriguing film
and it's topped off by a fantastic performance from Jake Gyllenhaal,
but at a brisk 90 minutes, I definitely feel the story could have been
fleshed out just a little bit. Melanie Laurent and Sarah Gadon barely
have much to do other than to be sexual objects for both Gyllenhaal
characters. Isabella Rosellini's character feels even more marginalized.

Once
the initial shock of Enemy's ending begins to wear off, the film
doesn't really leave much of an impression over time. I was definitely
engrossed by the film throughout its running time and think that
Villenueve's style is very intriguing. Knowing that Prisoners was filmed
after Enemy, I get excited when I think about what this director is
capable of. Maybe Enemy isn't as clever or sophisticated as it thinks,
but with the right material, Denis Villenueve is on the verge of making
something that will really knock us off our feet. Enemy feels little
more than an intriguing stepping stone. Worth the watch, but proceed
with caution.